Breast Implant Shortage Leaves Boob-Job-Happy Venezuela Flat

A shortage of breast implants has hit Venezuela, which has the fifth-highest number of boob jobs in the world.

According to CNN Money, the shortage is yet another item on a growing list of scarce products, following on the heels of food staples, toilet paper, etc. Like the other items, government policy is to blame; the nation's governing body decides who gets first access to dollars and other foreign currencies needed to import foreign products.

"Obviously, this situation is reflected in the higher costs of prostheses. If these costs go up or are increased, what happens then is that surgery is only available to those with higher incomes," said Dr. Ernesto Mendoza, a cosmetic and reconstructive surgeon working in the nation's capital, Caracas.

The Daily Mail reported that most surgeons prefer implants made in the U.S., however the scarcity and increasing costs are causing many women to opt for cheaper, less-safe Chinese alternatives, and sometimes agree to use implants that are the wrong size.

In some situations, women are turning to Craigslist and other online marketplaces to buy their implants from strangers on the black market.

Breast augmentation has become so popular in Venezuela that pharmacies, employers, and politicians have been known to raffle off the implants as part of a promotional campaign. Only the U.S., Brazil, Mexico, and Germany have more breast augmentation surgeries than Venezuela – which has a significantly smaller population than the other countries, but still nets a whopping 85,000 surgeries a year.

"It's a culture of 'I want to be more beautiful than you,' that's why even people who live in the slums get implants," said surgeon Daniel Slobodianik.